Turn taking components

The three linguists notice that the speaker could not start talking anytime he wants to. There is a special place of speaker change or place where the speaker transition becomes relevant. Thus, they describes the turn taking system in terms of two components and set of rules as follows:

A. Turn constructional component

It is the unit which constructs a turn. These units are characterized by predictability of their closure as a unit. The end of the unit is the place where speaker change can occur and the turn may pass to another speaker in order to keep the progression of turns in motion. It can be clausal, phrasal, or lexical (Herman, P80). Here example of single-word turns:

(a) Desk: What is your last name Loraine?
Caller: Dennis.
Desk: What?
Caller: Dennis.
Example of single-phrase turns:
(b) A: I have the- I have one class in the evening.
B: On Mondays?
Example of single-clause turns:
(c) A: Uh you been down here before havenche.
B: Yeh.
A: Where the sidewalk is?

(Sacks, Schegloff, Jefferson, pp 702-703. 05.Feb.2010)

Transition relevance Place (TRP) is the place at the end of TCU where speaker change may occur and the turn passes to another speaker, thus keeping the progression of turn motion (Herman, p80). That is to say, it is the transition point between the end of a turn and the beginning of other turn of other speaker. So, TRP makes it easy for each participant to recognize when he will be able to start or end the turn in each turn constructional unit. For example:

A: Do you want the red jacket (.) (TRP) or the blue one(TRP)
This example shows that the speaker completes two TRP in the turn. After the speaker finishes the first TRP, no participant takes the turn. So, the speaker continues speaking.

B. Turn-allocation component.

Turn allocation unit describe how turns are allocated among participants. Sacks et al. divide it into two groups:

Turn-allocation techniques are distributed into two groups: (a) those in which next turn is allocated by current speaker's selecting next speaker; and (b) those in which next turn is allocated by self-section. An example is:

Sara: Ben you want some ( )?
Ben: All right I'll have a,
((Pause))
Sara: Bill you want some?
Bill: No,
(Sacks, Schegloff, Jefferson, p703)

Here, Sara as a current speaker allocates the turn by the selection of next speaker, Ben in line one, and in line three Sara allocates her turn by self-selection. Thus, turn-allocation component regulates turn change among participants and comprise a set of rules for the allocation of next speaker's turn in order to get a smooth transition.